Rob,

Have you ever contacted the authors of the Trinity study? If you have, would it be possible to share with the community the details of that interaction?

You have been working to get these studies corrected for nine years and not once in that time have you presented the evidence that you have accumulated over the years to the authors of the study. That seems very odd.

If you are serious about having these studies corrected you should contact them by close of business today. It would be a win/win/win/win/win for all concerned.

There is no one alive who has pushed this issue as hard I have, Evidence.

And this hard pushing, over almost nine years, has included not a single attempt to discuss the matter with the authors of the most well known study in the field.

In the time it took you to compose that reply to me you could have composed an email to the trinity authors.

But you won’t because you prefer to regurgitate the same complaints about Greaney and Lindauer that you have been making for years.

One email Rob, that’s all. By close of business today, do you think you are up to the task?

Rob,

As you know from my posts, I’m glad I found your board years ago and continue to enjoy talks. I think you’ve done a good job of accumulating, synthesizing, and discussing the ramifications of Shiller’s work.

But I disagree about your “honest posting” stance in that I just don’t see any profound proscriptions on any investing topics, including various valuations-informed discussions. Indeed, they are having these very discussions right now on Bogleheads.

I believe most people who are invested (certainly friends and family members I know with whom I’ve shared investing talk) do not—and will not—read the boards simply because they would not want to do so. So it is not likely the markets will change with increased participants on investing sites, no matter the topics engaged.

I also don’t think markets would automatically become “efficient” with honest posting, since I believe they already are mostly efficient; we’ve been over that one, and supposed inefficiencies just have not been exploited with any consistency even as human (emotional) behavior will always be present.

I think Fama is mostly correct about the EMH, especially regarding the lack of sustained exploitation of supposed inefficiencies. Still, the biggest enemy an investor has (DYI investors, anyway) is the one looking at himself in the mirror, and that would likely endure with any model. Of course, advisors and money managers who are not fiduciaries also share blame for those who are not DYI.

I agree with Evidence, insofar as you can submit your own peer-reviewed work, or work with someone who can, and so refute issues you may have with particular studies.

I do think the biggest barrier to successful investing lies in a failure within our education system. Yet even there, one would encounter religious wars over what should be taught. Still, something needs to be taught better than is currently being done.

I look forward to your postings on the Shiller comments.

Peace,

Arty

Rob,

I just don’t see the ban on honest posting as you do. In fact, I see evidence for all sorts of views being expressed, even as I type this. But we’ll just disagree on that.
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Many get riled up on the web site boards for all sorts of reasons and they use the boards to make their life work for them in the same way they use other means. The nature of the beast. So, many responses come from places of emotions/fear, in my opinion, and the actual specifics of the argument (any argument, any subject) are actually secondary. (I see the same thing in Exercise Science.) Many are just using the vehicle as a tool for their emotional baggage.

That people have threatened you or your family is a different matter, of course, and needs to be addressed for that. I’ve zero tolerance for that.

There are also many good discussions on the boards.

As I’ve said before in the talks here with (Dripguy?), I thought you could be more effective in how you communicate things, but that is a long subject and best done elsewhere if at all. I’ve certainly no right to teach and have my own flaws. I will say, though, that some who take the time to correspond with you do have some portion of the truth regarding this topic, even if they express them roughly. Just my opinion.

It was only that I became motivated to read investing research or boards that I came to discover what I now know on the topic. Years ago, I found you linked to indexing and Bogle (on Google searches) when I wanted to see if there were contrary views to indexing really (learned about Shiller in particular). The rest is history, as they say. But I too was not particularly interested in the investing subject PRIOR to that, even as I was involved in peer-reviewed subjects ion other fields. My bad, as it would have helped me years before the internet.

And many will never do as I did because they are not motivated to do so and won’t become motivated. They just won’t do it in this field (possibly letting some “expert” handle it for them as many do). I’ve had people tell me this even after I pointed it out to them in personal discussion that it may be in their best interest to at least read a book.

I respect that you don’t want to submit research but disagree that it would be of no purpose served or that just because other research exists, you should leave it at that. All science is decidedly cumulative in nature. I’d like to see you throw-in and potentially make the cumulative weight of topic better.

Arty

Many are just using the vehicle as a tool for their emotional baggage.

Of course.

But in this case there are millions of people who will likely be suffering failed retirements in days to come because of it. How many lawsuits do you think are going to be filed against the Internet Sewer Rats in days to come because of the millions of failed retirements they caused with their “emotional baggage”?

And how about the site owners who failed to act after promising to protect us from that sort of thing?

And how about the experts who sat on their hands? I’ve sent John Bogle three e-maiils asking for his help re the Lindauer matter. Bogle has himself publicly acknowledged that valuations affect long-term returns. How do you think people are going to react when learning that after the next crash puts us in the Second Great Depression?

You want to be involved in that? I do not. I do this stuff to help people, not to destroy their lives and not to make myself liable for legal damages. Not interested, Arty.

I’ll continue to post honestly on the SWR matter and on all other matters of critical importance to investors and I’ll continue to urge all my fellow community members to help out the people with the “emotional baggage” by asking that they be removed from our boards until they gain some minimal control over their emotions.

There’s a reason why the published rules of every board permit honest posting and prohibit the tactics that have been employed to block it, Arty. Civilized, responsible people insist on this before they are willing to participate in discussions of investing.

It’s degrading to post honestly and it’s degrading to encourage others to post dishonestly. I want no part of it. I am willing to help those with emotional baggage. I am not willing to enable them to destroy themselves and others. It’s not my particular cup of tea. It’s not a close call.

Rob

I thought you could be more effective in how you communicate things

The entire problem is that I am too effective, Arty.

There are thousands of people who have expressed a desire that honest posting be permitted. Alex Frakt has acknowledged that the only reason I was banned is that I represent a “threat” to Buy-and-Hold. If I weren’t effective in helping to make people aware of the dangers of Get RIch Quick,why would he feel a need to ban me?

You don’t ban people who don’t represent a threat, Arty. Why would you?

Rob

And many will never do as I did because they are not motivated to do so and won’t become motivated.

A whole big bunch more will do it if we don’t threaten to kill those who post honestly, Arty. I mean, come on.

I have had hundreds of people write me e-mails and thank me for being the first person ever to tell them the truth about how stock investing works. The Stock-Selling Industry has spent hundreds of millions of dollars promoting what I think can fairly be characterized as the purest and most dangerous Get Rich Quick approach ever concocted by the human mind. You seriously don’t think it would make any difference if we spent those hundreds of millions of dollars promoting Valuation-Informed Indexing?

I don’t buy it.

The more people who learn about the realities of stock investing, the better it will be for all of us. There certainly is no possibility of any downside. Are you able to imagine any?

Rob

All science is decidedly cumulative in nature.

Science has precisely zero value until we gain the right to tell people about it, Arty.

Rob

There’s no question but that science is cumulative in nature, Wade. That’s why I added my point about valuations in my post of May 13, 2002. The idea was just to add to the work that has been done earlier. In theory, it was a very simple thing I was doing. And obviously a good thing.

You must acknowledge at this point that it has not turned out to be so simple and that there are some people who do not see it as so good. Right? The reaction we have seen for nine years running now has been INSANITY.

We have to understand why that is if we are to take this to a good place. The reason we are seeing the insanity is that the valuations issues is so fundamental to the stock investing project.

If we acknowledge that we know that valuations matter (we all obviously know this as an intellectual matter but many of us experience great emotional pain letting it in), we are compelled to change everything that has ever been said about stock investing. It scares people to take such a big step. It freaks people out. It hurts people’s pride. It causes people to feel regret over mistakes they have made during the days when they didn’t understand the realities. There are people who fear lawsuits in the event that investors come to understand the realities. As Alex Frakt said, this new knowledge represents a “threat” to people who made their names promoting the old knowledge. There are all sorts of things at work.

We’re not going to solve this problem by sending an e-mail to the authors of the Trinity study. They know intellectually as everyone else does that valuations matter. They are also suffering the same cognitive dissonance that everyone else (including you! — and including me at an earlier time) is suffering. That’s the problem we need to address.

We cannot solve the problem of cognitive dissonance in five minutes. People need to gradually get used to the implications of the new ideas. They need to be able to ask questions. They need to be able to ponder. They need to be able to talk things over. This is why I say that we need to open the entire internet to honest posting on safe withdrawal rates and all other important investment-related topics, just as we permit honest posting on sports and movies and nutrition and hundreds of other topics. There is no other way to advance.

As people see their friends one by one “getting it,” they will get it too. In the end there will not be one person alive on Planet Earth who will wish for a return to the old days. But people need to understand the benefits of the new model to fall in love with it. And people cannot understand what they will not emotionally accept. And people are not able to emotionally accept this in one take. People must be provided some means of being exposed to the new ideas gradually so that over time they can sink in and connect with them.

We have to start treating stock investing like every other subject. That’s the bottom line. We need not only to permit honest posting but to encourage it. We need to stop worrying that we might learn something and start looking forward to all the wonderful advances that are today within our reach.

This is the only thing that will work, Wade. I’ve had a front row seat to this show for nine years running now. I’m no investing expert in any conventional sense but I am certainly the world’s leading authority on how cognitive dissonance blocks people from understanding the implications of Shiller’s finding that valuations affect long-term returns. I know what I am talking about re this matter and I am telling the straight story here. The first step is opening all of our boards and blogs to honest posting.

The rest will all just follow easily once we do that. And every single person alive on Planet Earth today will be a lot better off once the number of us needed to make this happen work up the courage to demand it. Asking nicely won’t do the trick, Wade. The pain being felt here is too great. We are going to need to DEMAND honest posting (with only love in our hearts for the people feeling the pain , to be sure).

Rob